StarCraft 2, the best-selling PC-exclusive game of the year, is also one of the most pirated, with more than 2.3 million downloads adding up to almost 16 petabytes of data.

According to TorrentFreak, StarCraft 2 has set a new record for the amount of data transferred by a single torrent, with the most popular torrent file moving 15.77 petabytes of data across 2.3 million downloads. A petabyte, for those who don't know (and full disclosure, I had to Google it myself) is a billion megabytes. 15.77 billion megabytes of data. That's a lot.

Not that there's much danger of Blizzard going under as a result of the losses. StarCraft 2 was released near the end of July and by September had sold more than three million copies worldwide, excellent numbers for any game and particularly so for a PC exclusive. At the same time, this is apparently just the most popular torrent being measured so actual piracy numbers are almost certainly higher, and the fact that Blizzard can afford to absorb the loss doesn't mean it should have to.

TorrentFreak also pointed out that while 15.77 petas is a pile, Blizzard's own BitTorrent system may have actually moved more data through the distribution of legitimate copies of the game, although numbers to confirm that speculation aren't made available to the public.

Not necessarily. Don't get me wrong, this level of piracy is nothing short of horrifying, but the quality of the game ensured that Blizzard got an immense number of legit sales and that number continues to grow.

Nope. Now chances are future Blizzard/Activision games will include new, intrusive DRM to try and prevent this sort of thing from happening again. Even though it won't, but they're going to do something, regardless of if it helps or not.

Then more people will pirate, meaning harsher DRM, which leads to more pirating, and the circle goes around and around.

Not necessarily. Don't get me wrong, this level of piracy is nothing short of horrifying, but the quality of the game ensured that Blizzard got an immense number of legit sales and that number continues to grow.

Not necessarily. Don't get me wrong, this level of piracy is nothing short of horrifying, but the quality of the game ensured that Blizzard got an immense number of legit sales and that number continues to grow.

The "Which, frankly, I'm perfectly okay with." made it sound like it's a new thing or that it just feels more justified now. I mean, who would be okay with pirates playing on the official servers? Why even bother say this?

The "Which, frankly, I'm perfectly okay with." made it sound like it's a new thing or that it just feels more justified now. I mean, who would be okay with pirates playing on the official servers? Why even bother say this?

No. I'm just perfectly okay with pirates having to go through complex workarounds to play online with only other pirates.

I, too, am confused why a game that requires an ACTIVE BATTLE.NET ACCOUNT is such a popular piracy target. I guess it's possible that it's so thoroughly hacked that you can connect to other pirated copies through LAN or the web? That actually made me wonder enough to google it, and apparently that's not (yet) the case, so all these pirated copies can only play single player. When you could argue that's MAYBE half the game. I love the lore and the campaign modes, but Blizzard has not exactly been subtle with their E-sport mantra.

Sidestepping the whole DRM vs piracy issue... why even pirate in the first place? Did that many people really not already know if they'd enjoy friggin Starcraft 2 before buying it?

Which, frankly, I'm perfectly okay with. :P You don't pay, you shouldn't get to play

I believe the sentence ought to be ending right there, John. I'm getting tired of this self-entitled bullshit that gamers like to pull. If you don't pay, you don't play, just like any other entertainment medium out there.

Grey Walker:It's not as though you pirate and you can't buy the game as well. Some of those torrents may have been a chance to "test" the game, and it was later purchased by the same person legitimately.

A weak argument, but a possibility.

Not to mention re-downloads. 2.3 million pirated copies doesn't mean 2.3 million pirates. Many people will torrent it multiple times because their firs try didn't work, etc. A lot like MW2.

Halvhir:I, too, am confused why a game that requires an ACTIVE BATTLE.NET ACCOUNT is such a popular piracy target. I guess it's possible that it's so thoroughly hacked that you can connect to other pirated copies through LAN or the web? That actually made me wonder enough to google it, and apparently that's not (yet) the case, so all these pirated copies can only play single player. When you could argue that's MAYBE half the game. I love the lore and the campaign modes, but Blizzard has not exactly been subtle with their E-sport mantra.

Sidestepping the whole DRM vs piracy issue... why even pirate in the first place? Did that many people really not already know if they'd enjoy friggin Starcraft 2 before buying it?

Maybe they wanted to know if it was Starcraft 1 with only a new paint job.

Of course, he-who-must-not-be-named will probably read this, figure that obviously if they had locked up Starcraft a little tighter on the DRM side of things all these downloads would magically turn into sales and so I'm going to have to confirm my copy of Heart of The Swarm is legal every 10 seconds or Blizzard will kill my family.

Piracy isn't about whether or not you'll enjoy a game, it's about getting shit free. I personally know 5 people (half my social circle right there) who wouldn't even consider buying anything if it can be picked up free at inserttorrent.com. They're not customers, and no, the shitty Battle.net system, apparently, didn't change anything from the sales' side or the piracy side (seriously, Starcraft, a game from back when Blizzard was a relative unknown, still has 11 million sales and this will have a fucking hard time beating 5 or 6). Guess us consumers are gonna have to just deal with a dick in our ass for no god damn reason.